Jul 10, 2014

Replacing lock cylinders – important please read

Most of the locks on replacement doors rely on a ‘euro' profile cylinder or ‘oval’ profile cylinder to operate the locking mechanism. In recent years there has been a steady increase in the numbers of burglaries where these cylinders have been attacked to gain entry (discussed below). The police and security industry have known about these problems for several years, but because in the early days the techniques were used rarely and were confined to only a few locations around the UK, these problems were deliberately not broadcast to the public at large for fear of making the problem a lot worse. Instead, the security industry quietly and quickly developed measures to protect the cylinders from these attacks. With the methods of attack now widely broadcast across the internet your need to upgrade your door locks and associated hardware has become a lot more important. Before we find out what you can do about it let's first look at these attacks in a little more detail; something I wouldn't have written about a couple of years ago.

Cylinder snapping

The standard euro profile cylinder on your front door is essentially two cylinders together providing you with a keyway (Keyhole) on both faces of the door. If you live in a flat then your cylinder might have a thumb turn on the inner face instead of a keyway. In the middle of the cylinder is a cam that turns when you insert and turn the key or the thumb turn and it is this cam that operates the locking mechanism. The cylinder barrel is cast in one piece and the metal below the cam is quite thin. This is the weak point. Having snapped the cylinder and removed it from the door the thief can turn the cam with a screwdriver to release the locking mechanism.

There are essentially four techniques used to snap the cylinder in half. There are no 'official' terms for these techniques, but I think my own nomenclature just about hits the spot.....